Flora of New Zealand Series

C. acuminata Kirk Stud. Fl. 1899, 114.

Type: W, Kirk Herb., T. Kirk.

Habit similar; racemes with 2-6 pods. Pods (6)-9-(10) × c. 3 mm., subcompressed, subfalcate, obliquely narrow-ovate, tapering to straight beak ± 2 mm. long. Seeds 2, c. 2 × 1 mm., greenish yellow to reddish, heavily black-mottled.

DIST.: Type locality: White Rocks, East Coast.

Kirk (loc. cit.) describes the pods as "spreading, 1/4 in.-⅜ in. long, compressed, obpyriform, falcate, abruptly acuminate; beak straight, oblique. Seeds 2 or 1." Plants with similar pods occur along the South Makara Stream, Wellington. Simpson (loc. cit. 259) places the name as a synonym of C. flagelliformis var. corymbosa without comment.

I have not seen specimens of Colenso's C. multicaule (T.N.Z.I. 25, 1893, 329) and C. micrantha (T.N.Z.I. 26, 1894, 313) except the fragments at K. C. multicaule is described as a "Shrub about 10 ft. high erect, many stems close together from one rootstock . . . branchlets very numerous . . . 1/20 in. broad . . . panicles containing 7-11 flowers . . . Pod narrow-oblong 4 lines long including long stout beak 1-11/4 lines long . . . Open grassy flats in gullies south of Dannevirke . . . 1889-92: W. C." C. micrantha is described as: "A much-branched erect shrub, about 8 ft.-9 ft. high . . . branchlets numerous, alternate dichotomous, straight, striate, 8 in.-9 in. long, slender, terete, the larger ones about 1 line diameter, the youngest wiry, filiform, and pubescent . . . Calyx . . . half as long as corolla, slightly pilose . . . Corolla less than 1/10 in. long, standard purple with dark veins . . . Edges of forest, head of Rangitikei River, County of East Taupo; Mr. Patrick Stirling McLean: 1893."